


Mute Galra Keith (Commission)

by The_Sickfic_Sideblog



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Galra Keith (Voltron), Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Muteness, kallura
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-17
Updated: 2017-08-17
Packaged: 2018-12-16 11:31:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11827851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Sickfic_Sideblog/pseuds/The_Sickfic_Sideblog
Summary: A commission piece based on the Mute Galra Keith headcanons posted on my blog.After being captured and tortured by Haggar, Keith is finally rescued by his fellow paladins and put into a healing pod to recover. But things don't heal quite right.





	Mute Galra Keith (Commission)

Allura woke from her dreamless sleep to the sound of a healing pod opening with a harsh hiss. It was an unfortunately familiar sound. It sometimes echoed in her dreams, both getting sealed in a pod and falling out of one. But she wasn’t the one falling this time. This time, it was one of her paladins - the Red one.

She was up just in time to catch him. Whatever torture scars Haggar may have inflicted on Keith was now covered by a thin layer of purple fur. When he came back to the world of the living in her arms, his voice was practically non-existent.

“Don’t talk yet, you’re still recovering,” she insisted, easily scooping him up into a bridal carry, “I’m taking you back to your room where you can rest.”

Keith tried again to speak, but only harsh gasps of air came from his mouth. He looked startled at the sound, having expected at least some resemblance of a voice to come out. Allura easily caught the flash of fear in his eyes.

“You just need some rest. You had a long stay in the pod, give your voice time to warm up. Then we all need to discuss some things as a team.”

As she expected, Allura was greeted by Shiro when she entered Keith’s room. He was obviously fretting over his paladin, waiting for ages for him to wake up. When Shiro almost jumped at Keith’s new appearance, they exchanged knowing glances. It would be discussed later when Keith could actually talk.

But that time never came.

After a week of recovery, Keith’s lingering wounds had healed. His muscles returned to normal strength, and he was even adjusting to his new Galra features. But his voice hadn’t returned. The team tried everything. Coran cooked up medicine, both Altean and Galran in origin. Hunk tore up the kitchen and managed to make an equivalent to honey-ginger-lemon tea. They even opted to stick him back in the healing pod, but it rejected him, claiming nothing was wrong.

It was only when Allura and Keith were cleaning up the kitchen from dinner that it became obvious how distressed he was about this.

Everyone had left, as it was Allura and Keith’s turn to wash the dishes. Allura continued their one-sided conversation about training when she noticed how he stopped looking at her. His facial expressions had been his method of communication thus far, so it was a bit alarming when he cut it off. He focused intently on the dishes, scrubbing the food-goo off the bowls.

“Have I said something wrong?”

He shook his head. _No_.

Allura sighed. Now the guessing game began. “Do you disagree with my training tactics?”

 _No_.

“Are we just done talking, then?”

 _No_.

“Then what is it?” she huffed, putting the rest of the plates next to him, “I wish you could still talk, it would make things easier…”

He nodded. _Yes_.

The Princess narrowed her eyebrows when he turned away. She hadn’t exactly asked a question, what did he mean by that nod? Before she could ask further, she heard a tiny stifled gasp, and Keith reached his hand up to brush his cheek.

 _Oh_. It was _agreement_. Allura was quickly at a loss, hesitant to say anything or make any action. She didn’t feel prepared to deal with one of her paladins being this upset, much less the ever-grumpy Keith. But his shaky breaths and now trembling shoulders made her move. She put an arm around him and wordlessly guided him to her bedroom.

When the doors clicked shut behind them, Keith broke. He immediately clung to the princess, chest convulsing with raspy sobs that echoed across the chamber. Allura ushered him to the bed where they both sat down. What could she say? What _should_ she say? She wasn’t even sure of the extent of Keith’s tears. So she sat and rubbed his back, letting him cry and soak the shoulder of her dress.

Eventually, she settled on some words. “I’m sorry, Keith. I know it’s been hard for you.”

He nodded into her shoulder, grip still shut tight on her arms.

“You’ve done very well for your circumstances. We’ll figure out a solution soon.” With a steady hand, she smoothed down his hair. To Allura, the voiceless cries were almost worse than the normal ones. The desperation couldn’t be screamed out, the frustration couldn’t be shouted at someone. No wonder he spent more time in the training room - it was his now his only outlet.

The discomfort of sitting up eventually got to the two, and Allura tugged Keith down to lay properly on the bed. By then, he’d almost cried himself out, drifting in and out of a teary slumber. She kept a close eye on him until he finally dozed, his eyelids puffy and tired from the sobbing episode. And soon enough, Allura fell asleep as well.

This time, the princess didn’t wake up to a healing pod opening. She woke up to a strange silence - no alarms, no breakfast calls, and certainly no paladins sleeping beside her. She checked the clock. It was about 2 am earth time. _Where did he run off to?_

There wasn’t a need to tug on a nightgown after falling asleep in her clothes, so Allura got to searching quickly. Her first stop was the training room, of course, but it was completely empty. She checked the main deck, the kitchen, even the Lions’ hangar, and they were all void of Keith. Worry settled in her gut.

Until she checked a certain room that Pidge had used before. It was something like a classroom, a place where information was stored and retrieved in a teachable fashion, just as Pidge was learning Altean. But instead of strange creatures being projected into the room, it was a large pair of hands forming closed fists. And instead of the small Green Paladin, there was the Red one, sitting patiently in front of the hands and mimicking them.

“A, as in apple, arm, and Allura,” said the teaching module. Keith held up his closed fists, and the module flashed green. “Correct.”

Allura smiled from the doorway, watching Keith as he learned. Altean Sign Language. Looks like he found his solution all on his own.


End file.
